Lol. I know kind of a lot of really dumb doctors. It takes more of a work ethic than a brain that works especially well. In fact, one of those dumb doctors is coming to visit for ten days this summer. She's a Buddhist Republican. Well, she may not be Buddhist any more. She was a sihk for a while and she might be some kind of Xian at the moment although she doesn't have any interest proselytizing. But she's a weird bunch of nuts for sure.

Love is like a magic penny if you hold it tight you won't have any if you give it away you'll have so many they'll be rolling all over the floor

The takeaway from Trump's first 100 days in office isn't a list of accomplishments or failures but rather a nugget of hard-won knowledge about the president himself: He is so comprehensively ignorant of policy and history, so thoroughly lacking in a core of settled beliefs or convictions, that the Oval Office might as well be unoccupied.

Myth 3: The Country Should Be Run Like a BusinessRelated to the above two myths is the idea that the best person for the presidency is not only a political outsider, but one with experience running a business. Again, this is pretty bizarre. Businesses and governments do very different things to create jobs, providing mandated services is very different from serving voluntary customers for profit, and the federal government can print money and run debts over a very long time period while that might prove fatal to a business. But this, too, was one of Trump's rationales for running for office; he made money in the private sector (at least in some years), so he'd be good for the government's bottom line.

If anything, Trump seems, instead, to be importing some of the private sector's worst features, including secrecy, nepotism, self-dealing, and unaccountability. The thrift and efficiency one theoretically needs to survive in the business world are nowhere to be seen. He's spending on personal travel at a rate more than eight times that of his predecessor, who had no business experience.

It's too early to know whether Trump's business experience will make him a good job creator as president. The early evidence isn't great, but presidents don't actually have a whole lot of direct control in this area anyway.In some ways, Trump isn't a very fair test for these myths. It's certainly possible a different politically inexperienced corporate leader with a temperament more suited to politics might be running the executive branch considerably better at this point in a presidency. But he's doing some real damage to these persistent myths, and we may just end up better off for the experience.

"I would never consider my evaluation of his work to be fair minded unless I had actually read his own words." - Dave Hawkins

"It's kind of ridiculous how they are preparing to deal with Trump," said one source briefed extensively on the meeting's preparations. "It's like they're preparing to deal with a child -- someone with a short attention span and mood who has no knowledge of NATO, no interest in in-depth policy issues, nothing," said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "They're freaking out."

"...without considering any evidence at all - that my views are more likely - on average - to be correct. Because the mainstream is almost always wrong" - Dave Hawkins

The timing could've been better. Donald Trump hosted a strategy meeting on health care last night with a group of Republican senators - each of whom already agrees with the White House...

"Trump has privately wondered why legislators don't seem to listen to him, and the blow from Moran and Lee illustrated the limits of the president's capacity to master the art of the Washington deal."...

Given a chance to prove just how adept he was as a world-class negotiator and deal-maker, the Republican flunked the test spectaculalry. What emerged was a picture of a president who didn't understand the issue, didn't care to do his homework, showed no interest in policy or substantive details, wouldn't help sell his preferred plan to the public, and couldn't engage in meaningful negotiations because he simply didn't know what he was talking about.

The timing could've been better. Donald Trump hosted a strategy meeting on health care last night with a group of Republican senators - each of whom already agrees with the White House...

"Trump has privately wondered why legislators don't seem to listen to him, and the blow from Moran and Lee illustrated the limits of the president's capacity to master the art of the Washington deal."...

Given a chance to prove just how adept he was as a world-class negotiator and deal-maker, the Republican flunked the test spectaculalry. What emerged was a picture of a president who didn't understand the issue, didn't care to do his homework, showed no interest in policy or substantive details, wouldn't help sell his preferred plan to the public, and couldn't engage in meaningful negotiations because he simply didn't know what he was talking about.

"But the vote would have been, if you look at it, 48-4," he said. "That's a pretty impressive vote by any standard."

No, o orange moron, it's an abject failure by any standard. Especially the one standard you care about; winning.

Trump's retreat into his fantasy world is now complete.

Noticed that his schedule is light to nonexistent lately?

48-4, if you ignore the other 48 no's. Damn he is stupid, and desperate to claim any modicum of success in what has been 6 months of spectacular legislative failure and a marginalization of the U.S. in international politics to a level I did not think possible.

But he STILL has 30-35% popular support. What the actual fuck are people drinking that they don't see this bombastic know-nothing entitled arrogant cunt for what he is?

Trump himself said the amount of money he has changes 'depending on how I feel'.

He has claimed his 'brand' (his name) to be worth three billion dollars - this while building owners have been frantically removing the Trump logo from their facades due to it tanking occupation/sales/leases.

Trump claims he has that much. It fluctuates based on his feelings, remember?

More conservative estimates from people who, unlike Trump, do not make absurd claims on a regular basis, estimate it much lower: between 150 and 250 million. Considering that his father died in the 90's and left him most of his fortune, which the Trump family estimated at 300 million, it seems he has not performed nearly as well as the market.

Ermm... when a man *inherits* billions of dollars. And then manages to craftily turn that money into less money than he would have had if he put it in index funds.

How do you figure that?

mid-1970s: S&P ~400, Trump ~$40M2016: S&P ~2200, Trump ~$3B

S&P: 5.5XTrump: 75X

Geez, you are stupid.

What the indexes were in the 70's and now is irrelevant.

There is a thing called an "index fund". An index fund is a type of mutual fund with a portfolio constructed to match or track the components of a market index, such as the Standard & Poor's 500 Index (S&P 500). An index mutual fund is said to provide broad market exposure, low operating expenses and low portfolio turnover.

What matters is what would have happened if Trump had invested that $200 million in an index fund.

Trump's net worth has grown about 300% to an estimated $4 billion since 1987, according to a report by the Associated Press. But the real estate mogul would have made even more money if he had just invested in index funds. The AP says that, if Trump had invested in an index fund in 1988, his net worth would be as much as $13 billion.The S&P 500 has grown 1,336% since 1988.

Other billionaires' net worths have beaten the stock market's growth in that time. Bill Gates, for example, saw his grow increase 7,173% since 1988 to $80 billion. Warren Buffet's wealth grew 2,612% in the same time period, to $67.8 billion.

Even if the underlying assumptions are dodgy, the math at least is in the ballpark.

We used $40 million as the starting point for 1974. Honghui Chen, associate professor of finance at the University of Central Florida, told us the account would have grown to $3.94 billion by November 2015 if the money had followed the S&P 500 index and all dividends had been reinvested.

This is a rough calculation that ignores taxes owed on dividends, but it's on the same scale as what the National Journal reported.

Chen said it's trickier to calculate the value of $200 million invested in 1982.

"Because the stock market in 1982 was quite volatile, the current value of $200 million investment in 1982 would depend on the time at which it was initially invested," Chen said.

If it went in right at the end of 1981, it would be worth $6.7 billion. Invested in June 1982, the value today would be $8.3 billion. Invested at the end of 1982, it would be worth $9 billion. Again, in the neighborhood of what the Journal said.

There is a huge debate over Trump's current net worth. Estimates from outsiders, such as Bloomberg and Forbes, range from about $3 billion to about $4 billion. Trump says he has closer to $9 billion.

They rated the claim false because the details were wrong, but the numbers aren't.

"I would never consider my evaluation of his work to be fair minded unless I had actually read his own words." - Dave Hawkins